Orange Sour?

November 15, 1987|By George White of the Sentinel Staff

THE ORANGE Bowl bigwigs still are disgruntled that they probably won't have a chance at landing Notre Dame New Year's Day. They had attempted to collaborate with the Cotton Bowl, the winner of Miami-Notre Dame coming to the Orange, the loser going to Dallas. The Cotton Bowl, however, balked because of the possibility of an unappealing Miami-Arkansas rematch. Since Arkansas was knocked out of contention for the Cotton Saturday, speculation was rekindled that maybe the match could be made following the Miami-Notre Dame game Nov. 28. The Orange Bowl, which would much rather not issue a binding invite to the Hurricanes until the UM-Irish issue is settled, would love the cooperative- Cotton scenario. ''Lou Holtz said after today's game, 'I want to play in the Orange Bowl,' '' said Larry Adams, the president of the Orange Bowl committee. ''But the Cotton Bowl didn't accept our proposition, and I have no information on that now. All I can say is that we will have a meeting at 7:30 Monday morning to discuss the situation further.'' The Orange Bowl apparently doesn't want Notre Dame so badly that it would give the Irish an invitation before the Miami game. Miami probably will be favored in that one since the Hurricanes will be playing at home.

BRICKBATS FOR BRENT

Miami Coach Jimmy Johnson doesn't hide his displeasure with sportscaster Brent Musburger who recently told USA Today that Florida State would have been ranked ahead of UM if Florida State had kicked an extra point in an early- season meeting. The Seminoles went for two late in the game, failed and lost by a point. ''Brent takes for granted that it would have ended in a tie,'' Johnson said. ''He should give us some credit. We're averaging 42-plus points. We have a kicker who's 13-for-16, including a 52-yarder. We had scored on three of our last four possessions. And we would have had 42 seconds, and all three timouts, to go and break that tie. We would have broken the tie. It's irritating that he would assume it would have ended in a tie.''

HOKIES HIGH ON UM

ADD VIRGINIA Tech Coach Frank Beamer as the latest to testify to the Hurricanes' superiority. Beamer pored over UM films all week, then emerged from the darkroom summarily impressed. ''I haven't spotted any weaknesses,'' he said. ''You need something like the Dolphins down there to beat them. I tell you, I'm thoroughly impressed with the players on that team. I think they're just a great, great college football team.'' Beamer's Hokies have lost to two Top 10 teams this year, Clemson and Syracuse. Miami, he says, is better than either. ''I think Miami is more explosive offensively than both those teams,'' he said. ''They have the ability to score more quickly than either one of those teams.''

BOAT PEOPLE HAPPY

IT'S A University of Miami tradition that during Homecoming Week the students burn a boat in the campus lake. The students did the burn on Thursday night, and sure enough, the vessel sank. Reports are that Coach Jimmy Johnson breathed considerably easier upon receiving the news, unsure how his Hurricanes would handle Virginia Tech Saturday night.